Argentina
This vital collection of stories, vignettes, and prose poems takes readers on a literary journey that climbs the Andes Mountains, navigates the great River Plate, and traverses the expansive plains of the Pampas. Moving beyond the cultural icons associated with Argentina (such as gauchos, tango, and mat矇eacute;), these works reflect the country's strong cultural and literary traditions, challenging readers' imaginations while rousing their emotions. The book's handy pocket size makes it an ideal companion for visitors to Argentina.
Skipping Christmas
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - In this classic tale for modern times, beloved storyteller John Grisham offers a hilarious look at the chaos and frenzy that have become part of our holiday tradition. The inspiration for the film Christmas with the Kranks, starring Tim Allen and Jamie Lee CurtisImagine a year without Christmas. No crowded malls, no corny office parties, no fruitcakes, no unwanted presents. That's just what Luther and Nora Krank have in mind when they decide that, just this once, they'll skip the holiday altogether. Theirs will be the only house on Hemlock Street without a rooftop Frosty, they won't be hosting their annual Christmas Eve bash, they aren't even going to have a tree. They won't need one, because come December 25 they're setting sail on a Caribbean cruise. But as this weary couple is about to discover, skipping Christmas brings enormous consequences--and isn't half as easy as they'd imagined.
Life Lessons
One of Tallahassee's richest cultural entities, the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at FSU, has collected here an anthology of mostly true and some fictional stories and poems, all rich, warm and seasoned. You get tales: bird dogs sprayed yellow and sulfurous; a white girl walking dusty red clay Georgia back roads and meeting her first black woman alone; an offbeat mom zanier than Lucille Ball; a magical memory with hooting owls echoing across a Suwannee River of the past; the chilling monologue of an old man set on his last revenge. In a poem, the narrator talks about finding an old friend on line with whom she tests recipes "for rescue and disaster." What's not to love about a renaissance of words from a generation which has navigated its way through one world war, the cheery '50s, change-happy '60s, groovy '70s, greedy '80s, rich '90s, and into the next century? They have plenty to show us here. Mary Jane Ryals Poet Laureate of the Big Bend Tallahassee, Florida
Enemy Gods
In his first book, the Pulitzer Prize novel "Laughing Boy," Oliver La Farge gave us a superb lyrical story of Navajo Indian life. In the fullness of his maturity as a writer, he later returned to the Navajo scene with "The Enemy Gods," a richer, deeper book than he had written before and its theme, both an absorbing story and a living social document, is nearer to his heart. It centers around Myron Begay-Divine Arrow is his Indian name-a young Navajo who is apparently won away from his tribe until he believes that he can solve the problem of life by making an imitation white man out of himself. Never able to escape from what he really is-a potential leader of his own people-he becomes more and more confused until he finally breaks down and commits murder. As one under a curse, Myron instinctively goes back into the Navajo country where he drifts as a lost soul. Through a series of superb scenes, the story rises to the final emotional crisis leading to the solution of his life.
El Socialismo y el Hombre en Cuba / Socialism and Man in Cuba
El socialismo y el hombre en Cuba es una carta enviada por Ernesto Che Guevara a Carlos Quijano, director del Semanario Marcha. Se public籀 el 12 de marzo de 1965, bajo el t穩tulo Desde Argelia, para Marcha, La Revoluci籀n Cubana Hoy.Carlos Quijano (abogado, pol穩tico y ensayista, fundador y director del mencionado semanario uruguayo, naci籀 en Montevideo el 21 de marzo de 1900 y muri籀 en M矇xico el 10 de junio de 1984).En la edici籀n original Quijano a簽adi籀 la siguiente nota: Che Guevara envi籀 esta carta a Marcha desde Argelia. Este documento es de la m獺s significativa importancia, especialmente en aras de entender el objetivo y la meta de la Revoluci籀n cubana, visto por uno de los principales actores en el proceso. Las tesis presentadas son un intento por provocar debate y, al mismo tiempo, ofrecer una nueva perspectiva sobre una de las presentes fundamentaciones del pensamiento socialista.El 5 de noviembre de 1965, volvi籀 a publicarse El socialismo y el hombre en Cuba y se present籀 con el r籀tulo de exclusiva: una nota especial del Che Guevara.Se explicaba que los lectores de Marcha en Argentina no pudieron leer la publicaci籀n original. La semana en que 矇sta apareci籀 por primera vez, la revista se prohibi籀 en Buenos Aires.
Relatos / Stories
Esteban Borrero Echeverr穩a es el el principal exponente de la narrativa corta cubana. Sus relatos moralizantes y filos籀ficos, donde el simbolismoes parte importante, son el reflejo de las dudas y la inestabilidad social de su 矇poca.Uno de sus primeros relatos relato que da cuenta de las frustraciones de la naci籀n caribe簽a ante la emergencia colonizadora de Estados Unidos en 1902, cuando proclamada la Rep繳blica de Cuba. Se trata del El ciervo encantado (1905) y, seg繳n algunos cr穩ticos, inaugur籀 un estado de 獺nimo en la narrativa de la isla.Si bien El ciervo encantado es una clara alegor穩a de Estados Unidos, Calofilo (1879), es un retrato de un hombre perseguido por las dudas y elescepticismo. Cuesti籀n de monedas (1888) es un relato simb籀lico aparecido en Revista Cubana.En la presente selecci籀n de Relatos de Esteban Borrero incluimos las siguientes narraciones: Cuesti籀n de monedasMachito Pich籀nEl ciervo encantadoUna novelitaCalofiloEn ellos, una vez m獺s, se manifiesta el imaginario del autor.
On Writing
A master class in the art of writing by one of its most distinguished and innovative practitioners Delve into the labyrinth of Jorge Luis Borges's thoughts on the theory and practice of literature, and learn from one of the most influential writers of the twentieth century not only what a writer does but also what a writer is. For the first time ever, here is a volume that brings together Borges's wide-ranging reflections on writers, on the canon, on the craft of fiction and poetry, and on translation--an ars poetica of one of the twentieth century's greatest writers. Featuring many pieces appearing in English for the first time--including his groundbreaking early essay on magical realism, "Stories from Turkestan"--On Writing provides a map of both the changes and continuities in Borges's aesthetic over the course of his life. It is an indispensable handbook for anyone hoping to master their own style or to witness Borges's evolution as a writer.
On Mysticism
An unprecedented collection of the visionary Argentine writer's meditations on the mystical realm Jorge Luis Borges immersed himself and his readers in metaphysical fantasies--playing reason against faith, belief against logic. His profound knowledge of eastern religions was an endless source of inspiration for his writing. On Mysticism--edited by Borges's widow, Maria Kodama--brings together a stunning group of prose pieces and poems that speak to this signature theme of his writing, from some of his most celebrated works to others that appear here in English for the first time. Together they yield valuable insights into the most ineffable dimension of his writing, illuminating the inimitable rewards of this literary visionary, a wisdom writer whose belief in the magic of words has made him beloved around the world.
Collected Prose
The expanded edition of an essential collection of writings, essays, and interviews from Paul Auster, one of the finest thinkers and stylists in contemporary letters.The celebrated author of The New York Trilogy, The Book of Illusions, and 4 3 2 1 presents here a highly personal collection of essays, prefaces, true stories, autobiographical writings, and collaborations with artists, as well as occasional pieces written for magazines and newspapers, including his "breathtaking memoir" (Financial Times), The Invention of Solitude. Ranging in subject from Sir Walter Raleigh to Kafka, Nathaniel Hawthorne to the high-wire artist Philippe Petit, conceptual artist Sophie Calle to Auster's own typewriter, the World Trade Center catastrophe to his beloved New York City itself, Collected Prose records the passions and insights of a writer who "will be remembered as one of the great writers of our time" (San Francisco Chronicle).
Shirley Jackson
In one volume: The Haunting of Hill House, The Lottery, We Have Always Lived in the Castle, and much more "The world of Shirley Jackson is eerie and unforgettable," writes A. M. Homes. "It is a place where things are not what they seem; even on a morning that is sunny and clear there is always the threat of darkness looming, of things taking a turn for the worse." In this Library of America volume Joyce Carol Oates, our leading practitioner of the contemporary Gothic, presents the essential works of Shirley Jackson, the novels and stories that, from the early 1940s through the mid-1960s, wittily remade the genre of psychological horror for an alienated, postwar America. She opens with The Lottery (1949), Jackson's only collection of short fiction, whose disquieting title story-one of the most widely anthologized tales of the 20th century-has entered American folklore. Also among these early works are "The Daemon Lover," a story Oates praises as "deeper, more mysterious, and more disturbing than 'The Lottery, ' " and "Charles," the hilarious sketch that launched Jackson's secondary career as a domestic humorist. Here too are Jackson's masterly short novels: The Haunting of Hill House (1959), the tale of an achingly empathetic young woman chosen by a haunted house to be its new tenant, and We Have Always Lived in the Castle (1962), the unrepentant confessions of Miss Merricat Blackwood, a cunning adolescent who has gone to quite unusual lengths to preserve her ideal of family happiness. Rounding out the volume are 21 other stories and sketches that showcase Jackson in all her many modes, and the essay "Biography of a Story," Jackson's acidly funny account of the public reception of "The Lottery," which provoked more mail from readers of The New Yorker than any contribution before or since. LIBRARY OF AMERICA is an independent nonprofit cultural organization founded in 1979 to preserve our nation's literary heritage by publishing, and keeping permanently in print, America's best and most significant writing. The Library of America series includes more than 300 volumes to date, authoritative editions that average 1,000 pages in length, feature cloth covers, sewn bindings, and ribbon markers, and are printed on premium acid-free paper that will last for centuries.
American Lives
Memoirs are as varied as human emotion and experience, and those published in the distinguished American Lives Series run the gamut. Excerpted from this series (called "splendid" by Newsweek) and collected here for the first time, these dispatches from American lives take us from China during the Cultural Revolution to the streets of New York in the sixties to a cabin in the backwoods of Idaho. In prose as diverse as the stories they tell, writers such as Floyd Skloot, Ted Kooser, Peggy Shumaker, and Lee Martin, among many others, open windows to their own ordinary and extraordinary experiences. John Skoyles tells how, for his Uncle Fred, a particular "Hard Luck Suit" imparted misfortune. Brenda Serotte describes a Turkish grandmother who made her living reading palms, interpreting cups, and prescribing poultices for the community. In "Son of Mr. Green Jeans," Dinty W. Moore views fatherhood through the lens of pop culture. Janet Sternburg's Phantom Limb muses on the dilemmas of a child caring for a parent. Whether evoking moments of death or disease, in family or marriage, history, politics, religion, or culture, these glimpses into singular American lives come together in a richly textured, colorful patchwork quilt of American life.
In the Presence of the Sun
"In the Presence of the Sun presents 30 years of selected works by [N. Scott] Momaday, the well-known Southwest Native American novelist. His unadorned poetry, which recounts fables and rituals of the Kiowa nation, conveys the deep sense of place of the Native American oral tradition. Here are dream-songs about animals (bear, bison, terrapin) and life away from urban alienation, an imagined re-creation based on Billy the Kid, prose poems about Plains Shields (and a fascinating discussion of their background), and new poems that utilize primary colors ('forms of the earth') to express instinctive continuities of a pre-Columbian vision."--Library Journal"The strong, spare beauty of In the Presence of the Sun is compelling evidence that Scott Momaday is one of the most versatile and distinguished artists in America today."--Peter Matthiessen". . . the images, the voices, the people are shadowy, elusive, burning with invention, like flames against a dark sky. For behind them is always the artist-author himself . . . a man with a sacred investiture. Strong medicine, strong art indeed."--The New York Times Book Review
Robert Frost: Speaking on Campus
Gathered by Edward Connery Lathem, editor ofThe Poetry of Robert Frost, and introduced by Pulitzer Prize winning journalist David M. Shribman, Robert Frost: Speaking on Campus reveals Frost in the setting of both classroom and lecture hall, where he inspired thousands. "
Splendor in the short grass
Honorable Mention, Carr P. Collins Award for Best Book of Nonfiction, 2006 Grover Lewis was one of the defining voices of the New Journalism of the 1960s and 1970s. His wry, acutely observed, fluently written essays for Rolling Stone and the Village Voice set a standard for other writers of the time, including Hunter S. Thompson, Joe Eszterhas, Timothy Ferris, Chet Flippo, and Tim Cahill, who said of Lewis, "He was the best of us." Pioneering the "on location" reportage that has become a fixture of features about moviemaking and live music, Lewis cut through the celebrity hype and captured the real spirit of the counterculture, including its artificiality and surprising banality. Even today, his articles on Woody Guthrie, the Allman Brothers, the Rolling Stones concert at Altamont, directors Sam Peckinpah and John Huston, and the filming of The Last Picture Show and One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest remain some of the finest writing ever done on popular culture. To introduce Grover Lewis to a new generation of readers and collect his best work under one cover, this anthology contains articles he wrote for Rolling Stone, Village Voice, Playboy, Texas Monthly, and New West, as well as excerpts from his unfinished novel The Code of the West and his incomplete memoir Goodbye If You Call That Gone and poems from the volume I'll Be There in the Morning If I Live. Jan Reid and W. K. Stratton have selected and arranged the material around themes that preoccupied Lewis throughout his life--movies, music, and loss. The editors' biographical introduction, the foreword by Dave Hickey, and a remembrance by Robert Draper discuss how Lewis's early struggles to escape his working-class, anti-intellectual Texas roots for the world of ideas in books and movies made him a natural proponent of the counterculture that he chronicled so brilliantly. They also pay tribute to Lewis's groundbreaking talent as a stylist, whose unique voice deserves to be more widely known by today's readers.
Land of the Permanent Wave
Edwin "Bud" Shrake is one of the most intriguing literary talents to emerge from Texas. He has written vividly in fiction and nonfiction about everything from the early days of the Texas Republic to the making of the atomic bomb. His real gift has been to capture the Texas Zeitgeist. Legendary Harper's Magazine editor Willie Morris called Shrake's essay "Land of the Permanent Wave" one of the two best pieces Morris ever published during his tenure at the magazine. High praise, indeed, when one considers that Norman Mailer and Seymour Hersh were just two of the luminaries featured at Harper's during Morris's reign. This anthology is the first to present and explore Shrake's writing completely, including his journalism, fiction, and film work, both published and previously unpublished. The collection makes innovative use of his personal papers and letters to explore the connections between his journalism and his novels, between his life and his art. An exceptional behind-the-scenes look at his life, Land of the Permanent Wave reveals and reveres the life and calling of a writer whose legacy continues to influence and engage readers and writers nearly fifty years into his career.
Coming of Age in the 21st Century
Following in the footsteps of the highly successful Coming of Age in America and Coming of Age Around the World, this new anthology of fiction and memoir explores coming of age in the new millennium. Twenty-one stories by noted authors including Sherman Alexie, Mary F. Chen, Junot Diaz, Louise Erdrich, Seth Kantner, and ZZ Packer explore the trials and tribulations of growing up in our increasingly fragmented world. Issues of identity, sexuality, solitude, and conflict are beautifully presented through the voices of writers of all ages and ethnicities, from Lan Samantha Chang tackling absent or dead parents in "The Eve of the Spirit Festival" to Emily Rabateau addressing race in "Mrs. Turner's Lawn Jockeys." With a preface and introductions to each piece by Mary Frosch providing cultural context, this collection is a stunning literary tribute to a new generation of global citizens that provides a distinctively American sense of hope.
Bad Girls
"I behave badly to set myself apart. To test myself. To push myself. To prove something. To shock someone. ... I behave badly because I can." That's how Ellen Sussman describes her mischievous endeavors. In this anthology of personal essays, she's invited twenty-five other bad girl writers to share their stories. Ann Hood lies; Mary Roach confesses. Erica Jong, the original bad girl, challenges her own claim to that fame. Caroline Leavitt marries and cheats. These pages bristle with danger. The writers dig deep--bad behavior lies in their souls. And what they bring to the surface reveals telling truths about our psyches and our society.
Natural History of the Intellect
At his death in 1882, Emerson left behind a trove of unpublished material extraordinary for its quantity and depth-hundreds upon thousands of pages of journals, letters, notebooks, and lectures that dwarf his nine books in volume and scope but were never seen during his lifetime. His most important manuscripts have gradually filtered through to the public over the course of the last hundred and twenty-five years, save one: the final product of what he himself considered to be the "chief task of his life." Here for the first time in print are the last lectures of Emerson's career, a cycle of seventeen that he delivered at Harvard University in 1871. In his last lectures, Emerson set out to gather and structure the best thoughts of a project that spanned thirty-three years and ran as a constant, though largely hidden, thread throughout his active career. The result is a vibrant fabric of thought, image, and word as startling for the boldness of its pattern as for its immediacy and relevance to the modern reader. The powers of the mind and states of consciousness, the transcendency of physical into spiritual laws, the governing influence of Ideas in the history of humankind, and the ethical duty laid upon those who recognize the Good Cause as their own-all serve as themes and elements of Emerson's portrait of a practical understanding of the -spiritual foundations of human experience and self-development.
The Bandana Republic
Urban youth gangs are typically viewed as no more than training grounds for thugs and felons. This breakthrough anthology presents a far different picture, revealing present and former gang members' and street activists' artistic impulses, emotional sensitivities, political beliefs, and capacities to assess the social conditions that created them. The Bandana Republic contains powerful writing: fiction and essays, poetry, and polemics written by adolescents from gangs like the Crips and Bloods and the Mexican Mafia. There's also creative work by ex-gangbangers who have become activists, artists, musicians, and movie stars. J. Sheeler's "Seven Immortals" finds grim poetry in a young girl's gang initiation. Jaha Zainabu's "The Jungle (Blood Territory)" is a lacerating portrait of an L.A. Blood. Commander's "The Brothas Gunnin'" piercingly profiles a neighborhood -- and a world -- under siege. These writings give voice to an American subculture far richer and more complex than the headlines indicate.
Guys and Dolls and Other Writings
From Dave the Dude to Al Capone: a defining collection from the world of Damon Runyon Damon Runyon grew up in the West, moved to New York City, and became one of the leading voices of American popular culture. From sports writing to short fiction, this unique collection offers an eclectic sampling of his extraordinary talent. Here are newspaper pieces, stories- including the last one he ever composed-poetry, and, of course, the Broadway tales for which he is chiefly remembered: Guys and Dolls, Blood Pressure, The Bloodhounds of Broadway, and others. Featuring works that are impossible to find elsewhere, and Runyon's signature eye for detail-particularly the sounds, smells, and tastes of New York-this book brings an American icon to a new generation of readers. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
In The Shadow of Los Alamos
Edith Warner (1893-1951), who lived by the Rio Grande at the Otowi Switch in northern New Mexico, has become a legendary figure owing largely to her portrayal in two books: The Woman at Otowi Crossing, by Frank Waters, and The House at Otowi Bridge, by Peggy Pond Church. Because she is famous for her tearoom, where she entertained scientists from the Manhattan Project, few people realize that Edith Warner was a serious writer. Here for the first time she is allowed to speak for herself.The book's title is taken from an autobiographical fragment published here for the first time. Also included are letters, essays published and unpublished, and journal entries (salvaged by various friends from the original, which was burned after Warner's death at her request). The editor provides a useful introduction outlining Edith Warner's life and sets it in local and historical context, along with a wonderful collection of period photographs and a facsimile of Edith's famous chocolate cake recipe.Thousands of readers have been fascinated by this modest woman whose friendships with Pueblo Indians and atomic scientists seem to epitomize the paradoxes of life in New Mexico. To read this book is to hear her own quiet voice, describing pueblo ceremonials, detailing the difficulties of life during the war years, and above all recording her own spiritual relationship with the New Mexico landscape. For Edith Warner her work in the world--building a house, running a restaurant, writing it all down--was a kind of meditation. People still come to New Mexico for the reasons that drew her here eighty years ago, and her response to New Mexico can now take its rightful place in the state's cultural heritage.
Interior Places
"We must include Knopp among those whom Barry Lopez calls our 'local geniuses of the American landscape, '" Fran Shaw remarks in the journal Parabola. And, indeed, in this new book, Lisa Knopp's singular genius burrows deep into that landscape in showing us what it is to know, feel, and inhabit unique yet quintessentially American places. A collection of essays embracing nonfiction from memoir and biography to travel writing and natural history, Interior Places offers a curiously detailed group photograph of the Midwest's interior landscape. Here is an essay about the origin, history, and influence of corn. Here we find an exploration of a childhood meeting with Frederick Leopold, youngest brother of the great naturalist Aldo. Here also are a chronicle of the 146-year alliance between Burlington, Iowa, and the Burlington Route (later the CB&O, the BN, and finally, the BNSF) and a pilgrimage to Amelia Earhart's Kansas hometown. Whether writing about the lives of two of P. T. Barnum's giants or the "secret" nuclear weapons plant in southeastern Iowa, about hunger in Lincoln, Nebraska, or bird banding on the Platte River, Knopp captures the inner character of the Midwest as Nature dictates it, people live it, and history reveals it.
The Mitford Bedside Companion
A must-have treasury filled with original essays and personal photos from Jan Karon, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the beloved Mitford series. For the millions of fans who love the Mitford Years novels, this lushly illustrated keepsake will be the perfect book to curl up with. What was that Uncle Billy joke about the census taker? Where was that beautiful prayer Father Tim offered? The Mitford Bedside Companion will make it easy to find the greatest of the countless gems that grace each of Karon's novels. Fans will relish favorite scenes, casts of characters, a Mitford crossword puzzle, and a bevy of original essays by Karon on everything from the life of a writer to her grandmother's secret to good health. With a color insert of family photos and Karon's early Mitford drawings, as well as new illustrations, this is a beautifully packaged volume everyone will cherish.
The Portable Jack Kerouac
This definitive Kerouac collection--the only anthology of his work ever published--is an essential introduction to one of the country's most influential writers. "Kerouac's work represents the most extensive experiment in language and literary form undertaken by an American writer of his generation."--The New York Times Book Review This one-volume omnibus, planned by Kerouac himself before his death and completed by his biographer, Ann Charters, makes clear the ambition and accomplishment of Jack Kerouac's "Legend of Duluoz"--the story of his life told in the course of his many "true-story novels." As Kerouac once wrote, "The whole thing forms one enormous comedy, seen through the eyes of poor Ti Jean (me), otherwise known as Jack Duluoz, the world of raging action and folly and also of gentle sweetness seen through the keyhole of his eye." This compilation presents selections from the "Legend of Duluoz" novels, in chronological order, from Dr. Sax to On the Road to Big Sur, and also includes poetry, letters, and essays on Buddhism, writing, and the Beat Generation. The Portable Jack Kerouac offers a total immersion in the mind of an American master. Penguin Classics is the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world, representing a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
Coming of Age Around the World
Following in the footsteps of the highly successful Coming of Age in America, this collection of twenty-four stories from around the world is a wonderful introduction to literature rarely available to American readers. Editors Faith Adiele and Mary Frosch magnificently chart the global quest for identity, and make a strong case for the personal and political importance of sharing our stories as they consider whether coming of age is a Western-or universal-concept. Featuring an array of voices from every continent, this anthology includes luminaries like Ben Okri and Chang-rae Lee, as well as recent bestsellers Marjane Satrapi and Alexandra Fuller, in addition to a variety of authors renowned abroad but less well known to North American audiences. The diversity extends to form, encompassing fiction and memoir, graphics, lyric prose, and tales in pidgin and patois. The world presented is complex and current, some inhabitants routinely switching country and language, others trapped by global events that shape us all. Detailed introductions provide historical and cultural context, particularly for Africa and the Muslim world.
The Best Creative Nonfiction
Lee Gutkind, proclaimed the "Godfather behind creative nonfiction" by Vanity Fair, along with the staff of his landmark journal Creative Nonfiction, has culled alternative publications, 'zines, blogs, podcasts, literary journals, and other often overlooked publications in search of new voices and innovative ideas essays and articles written with panache and power. "The Truth About Cops and Dogs," by Rebecca Skloot, describes a vicious pack of wild dogs, preying on the domesticated pets of Manhattan. Monica Wojcik's "The w00t Files," for the chic geek crowd, comes directly from John McPhee's famous Literature of Fact workshop at Princeton, a launching pad for famous young writers. Daniel Nestor, of McSweeney's and Bookslut, explains James Frey, while the very overweight Michael Rosenwald becomes a Popular Science nearly nude centerfold in a quest for knowledge about high-tech diagnostics.
Rotten English
Rotten English spans the globe to offer an overview of the best non-standard English writing of the past two centuries, with a focus on the most recent decades. What would once have been derogatorily termed "dialect literature" has come into its own in a language known variously as slang, creole, patois, pidgin, or, in the words of Nigerian novelist Ken Saro-Wiwa, "rotten English." The first anthology of its kind, Rotten English celebrates vernacular literature from around the English-speaking world, from Robert Burns, Mark Twain, and Zora Neale Hurston to Roddy Doyle, Jonathan Safran Foer, and M. NourbeSe Philip. With concise introductions that explain the context and aesthetics of the vernacular tradition, this anthology pays tribute to the changes English has undergone as it has become a global language.
For One More Day再給我一天
This is the story of Charley, a child of divorce who is always forced to choose between his mother and his father. He grows into a man and starts a family of his own. But one fateful weekend, he leaves his mother to secretly be with his father--and she dies while he is gone. This haunts him for years. It unravels his own young family. It leads him to depression and drunkenness. One night, he decides to take his life. But somewhere between this world and the next, he encounters his mother again, in their hometown, and gets to spend one last day with her--the day he missed and always wished he'd had. He asks the questions many of us yearn to ask, the questions we never ask while our parents are alive. By the end of this magical day, Charley discovers how little he really knew about his mother, the secret of how her love saved their family, and how deeply he wants the second chance to save his own.
Now Dig This
Acclaimed novelist, Beat godfather, prolific screenwriter, and one of the founders of New Journalism, as well as the only guy to wear shades on the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's cover, Terry Southern was an audacious original. Now Dig This is a journey through Terry Southern's America, from the buttoned-down '50s through the sexual revolution, rock 'n' roll, and independent cinema (which he helped inaugurate by cowriting and producing Easy Rider), up to his death in 1995. It spans Southern's stellar career, from early short stories and a Paris Review interview with Henry Green, to his legendary Esquire piece covering the 1968 Chicago Democratic Convention with Jean Genet and William Burroughs and his equally infamous account of life neck-high in girls and cocaine aboard The Rolling Stones' tour jet, to his memories of twentieth-century legends like Abbie Hoffman, Kurt Vonnegut, and Stanley Kubrick, with whom he wrote Dr. Strangelove. "A voice electric with street rhythm and royal with offhand intellection ... stuffed with strange and silken scraps." -- Troy Patterson, Entertainment Weekly "The subterranean Texan's finest moments are exquisite reads ... like a hot poker in the eye of conventional narrative." -- A. D. Amorosi, Philadelphia City Paper "The range of writing ... [was] as lethal as Mailer claimed and still awaiting the attention it deserves." -- Charles Taylor, Newsday "... reveals a writer defined by his generosity, by the pursuit of fun and by an insatiable ... literary appetite...." -- Claire Dederer, The New York Times Book Review
Wry Harvest
If you live in the Midwest, you have to know how to laugh. Tornados, floods, drought, and miles and miles of flat land: if you don't have a sense of humor, you might want to consider living somewhere else. Humor is as natural to the Midwest as cow pats and corn mazes, seed caps and road kill, Johnny Carson and David Letterman.This book gathers some of the best stories from the humorists of the big belly of America, past and present. Here are Mark Twain, George Ade, Finley Peter Dunne, Don Marquis, and Ring Lardner; James Thurber, Ruth McKenney, Erma Bombeck, Calvin Trillin, and Garrison Keillor--Midwesterners, one and all. There's even a piece from William Dean Howells, not usually known for his knock-me-down humor. You'll also find tales from Ambrose Bierce, Kin Hubbard, Sinclair Lewis, Mike Royko, Donald Kaul, P. J. O'Rourke, and Bill Bryson.Here is a book to curl up with when the cows don't come home, the crick's flooded, and the fox has bedded down in the henhouse. It'll put a smile on your face and make you glad you don't live in New York City, even if you do.
The Subway Chronicles
Some seven million people board the New York City subway every day, each one with a story to tell. The Subway Chronicles collects twenty-seven of the tales, dramas and comedies that unfold during the daily commute. From the "mole people" living in the subway tunnels, to the transit employees working behind the scenes, to the locals and tourists riding shoulder-to-shoulder in harmony, discord, or indifference, The Subway Chronicles offers a kaleidoscope of perspectives on this most public of spaces.Prominent New York writers weigh in: Jonathan Lethem confesses his childhood subway sinsColson Whitehead offers mass-transit tips for newcomers to the cityFrancine Prose recalls the thrill and apprehension of riding alone as a teenage girlCalvin Trillin pokes fun at the classic New York tendency to be skeptical about everythingStan Fischler delights in memories of riding the open-air train cars to Coney Island as a boyEqual parts hilarious, poignant, and heartbreaking, The Subway Chronicles is a journey into New York's underground with some of today's most loved writers.
The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2005
The Best American Series First, Best, and Best-Selling The Best American series has been the premier annual showcase for the country's finest short fiction and nonfiction since 1915. For each volume, the very best pieces are selected by a leading writer in the field, making the Best American series the most respected--and most popular--of its kind. The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2005 includes Daniel Alarc籀n - Aimee Bender - Dan Chaon - Daniel Clowes - Tish Durkin - Stephen Elliott - Al Franken - Jhumpa Lahiri - Rattawut Lapcharoensap - Anders Nilsen - Georges Saunders - William T. Vollmann - and others Dave Eggers, editor, is the author of A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, You Shall Know Our Velocity!, and How We Are Hungry, and the editor of McSweeney's. He is the founder of 826 Valencia, a San Francisco writing lab for young people. Beck, guest introducer, whose single "Loser" was instantly labeled an anthem for the slacker generation, is also known for his Grammy Award-winning albums Odelay and Mutations.
Beloved Harlem
A passionate ode to an American mecca, Beloved Harlem is a literary look into the vibrant African-American haven, edited by one of its celebrated native sons. William H. Banks, Jr., combines the classics with the contemporary as he showcases some of the best essays, short stories, and novel excerpts inspired by the diversity of Harlem life, from the early twentieth century to the new millennium. The days and nights of black Manhattan come alive in the words of historically famous writers like W.E.B. Dubois, Zora Neale Hurston, Langston Hughes, Dorothy West, Ossie Davis, and Toni Morrison, along with the works of brilliant newcomers to the neighborhood, including Brian Keith Jackson's witty examination of identity politics in The Queen of Harlem and Rosemarie Robatham's "Dreaming in Harlem," a moving tale about a woman at the edge of society who finds sanctuary with a stranger. From renaissance through tough times to revitalization, this triumphant homage gives Harlem the historical perspective it so rightly deserves. Beloved Harlem is a welcome addition to the libraries of readers who are either already in love with Harlem or ready to take the fall.
The Sport Of The Gods
Paul Laurence Dunbar (1872 1906) overcame racism and poverty to become one of the best-known authors in America, and the first African American to earn a living from his poetry, fiction, drama, journalism, and lectures. This original collection includes the short novel The Sport of the Gods, Dunbar s essential essays and short stories, and his finest poems, such as Sympathy, all which explore crucial social, political, and humanistic issues at the dawn of the twentieth century."
The Minnesota Stories Of Sinclair Lewis
Wickedly funny and surprisingly fresh, these stories offer a unique look at on of the most important American writers of the twentieth century
Cold Snap As Yearning
Whether confronting a gravel road, a hallucinatory vision of a horse-woman, a deep sensitivity to noise, or the curiosity of crows, Robert Vivian sees the world in a novel way, and this collection gives readers the opportunity to share his unique and intriguing vision.
Masterpieces Of American Indian Literature
The five complete and unabridged works collected here are parts of a long and passionate testimony about American Indian culture as related by Indians themselves. Deep emotions and life-shaking crises converge in these pages concerning identity, family, community, caste, gender, nature, the future, the past, solitude, duty, trust, betrayal, leadership, war, and apocalypse. Each work is also regarded as a classic of Native literature and has much to teach. The Life of Kah-ge-ga-gah-bowh (1847) by George Copway, a Canadian Ojibwe writer and lecturer, describes his unique and difficult cultural journey from the tiny village of his youth to the legislatures of the world, speaking for the rights and sovereignty of Indians. The Soul of the Indian (1911) by Charles Eastman, a physician and mixed-blood Sioux, depicts "the religious life of the typical American Indian as it was before he knew the white man." American Indian Stories (1921) by Zitkala-Sa, one of the most famous Sioux writers and activists of the modern era, includes legends and tales from oral tradition, childhood stories, and allegorical fiction. Coyote Stories (1933) by Mourning Dove, an Okanagan writer, retells the popular trickster tales of Coyote, the most resilient character in all of American literature. Black Elk Speaks (1932) as told through John G. Neihardt, is the spacious religious vision and candid life story of a Lakota holy man. Neihardt and Black Elk collaborated to produce a unique and inspirational work.
Leaves Of Grass
As featured in AMC's Breaking Bad, given by Gale Boetticher to Walter White and discovered by Hank Schrader. "I celebrate myself, And what I assume you shall assume, For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you. I loafe and invite my soul, I lean and loafe at my ease....observing a spear of summer grass." So begins Leaves of Grass, the first great American poem and indeed, to this day, the greatest and most essentially American poem in all our national literature. The publication of Leaves of Grass in July 1855 was a landmark event in literary history. Ralph Waldo Emerson judged the book "the most extraordinary piece of wit and wisdom America has yet contributed." Nothing like the volume had ever appeared before. Everything about it--the unusual jacket and title page, the exuberant preface, the twelve free-flowing, untitled poems embracing every realm of experience--was new. The 1855 edition broke new ground in its relaxed style, which prefigured free verse; in its sexual candor; in its images of racial bonding and democratic togetherness; and in the intensity of its affirmation of the sanctity of the physical world. This Anniversary Edition captures the typeface, design and layout of the original edition supervised by Whitman himself. Today's readers get a sense of the "ur-text" of Leaves of Grass, the first version of this historic volume, before Whitman made many revisions of both format and style. The volume also boasts an afterword by Whitman authority David Reynolds, in which he discusses the 1855 edition in its social and cultural contexts: its background, its reception, and its contributions to literary history. There is also an appendix containing the early responses to the volume, including Emerson's letter, Whitman's three self-reviews, and the twenty other known reviews published in various newspapers and magazines. This special volume will be a must-have keepsake for fans of Whitman and lovers of American poetry.
Fifty Years Of The Texas Observer
The Observer's best work to celebrate fifty years
The Mexico City Reader
Mexico City is one of Latin America's cultural capitals, and one of the most vibrant urban spaces in the world. The Mexico City Reader is an anthology of "Cronicas"--short, hybrid texts that are part literary essay, part urban reportage--about life in the capital. This is not the "City of Palaces" of yesteryear, but the vibrant, chaotic, anarchic urban space of the1980s and 1990s--the city of garbage mafias, necrophiliac artists, and kitschy millionaires. Like the visitor wandering through the city streets, the reader will be constantly surprised by the visions encountered in this mosaic of writings--a textual space brimming with life and crowded with fl璽neurs, flirtatious students, Indian dancers, food vendors, fortune tellers, political activists, and peasant protesters. The essays included in this anthology were written by a panoply of writers, from well-known authors like Carlos Monsiv獺is and Jorge Ibag羹engoitia to younger figures like Fabrizio Mej穩a Madrid and Juieta Garc穩a Gonz獺lez, all of whom are experienced practitioners of the city. The texts collected in this anthology are among the most striking examples of this concomitant "theory and practice" of Mexico City, that most delirious of megalopolises. "[An] exciting literary journey . . ."--Carolyn Malloy, Multicultural Review
The Uses of Slime Mould
Including pieces on Gregory Bateson, William Faulkner, Philip Pullman, Sir Oswald Mosley's politics, religion and stammering, this diverse collection gathers essays written by Nicholas Mosley over the past forty years. Resembling the behaviour of slime mould - a strange organism made up of separate amoebae that temporarily form a single pillar which then bursts in order to scatter its seeds across the forest floor - the ideas found in these essays converge and disperse, crossing over into other disciplines, and creating a unique way of looking at the world, one echoed in Mosley's fictional writings.
Power in the Global Information Age
Power in the Global Information Age collects together many of Joseph S. Nye Jr's key writings for the first time as well as some important new material.
The Portable Beat Reader
Beginning in the late 1940's, American literature discovered a four-letter word, and the word was "beat." Beat as in poverty and beatitude, ecstasy and exile. Beat was Jack Kerouac touring the American road in prose as fast and reckless as a V-8 Chevy. It was the junk-sick surrealism of William Burroughs; the wild, Whitmanesque poetry of Allen Ginsberg; and the lumberjack Zen of Gary Snyder. The Portable Beat Reader collects the most significant writing of these and fellow members (and spiritual descendants) of the Beat Generation, including Neal Cassady, Gregory Corso, Diane di Prima, Bob Dylan, Leroi Jones, and Michael McClure. In poetry, fiction, essays, song lyrics, letters, and memoirs, it captures the triumphant rudeness, energy, and exhilaration of a movement that swept through American letters with hurricane force. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
The Gertrude Stein Reader
This anthology collects 51 of Stein's most experimental poems, stories, portraits, and plays.
Gumbo: A Celebration of African American Writing
A literary rent party to benefit the Hurston/Wright Foundation of African-American fiction, with selections to savor from bestselling authors as well as talented rising stars. Not since Terry McMillan's Breaking Ice have so many African-American writers been brought together in one volume. A stellar collection of works from more than fifty hot names in fiction, Gumbo represents remarkable synergy. Edited by bestselling luminaries Marita Golden and E. Lynn Harris, this collection spans new and previously published tales of love and luck, inspiration and violation, hip new worlds and hallowed heritage from voices such as: - Edwidge Danticat- Eric Jerome Dickey- Kenji Jasper- John Edgar Wideman- Terry McMillan- David Anthony Durham- Bertice Berry...and many, many more Also featuring original stories by Golden and Harris themselves, Gumbo heralds the debut of the Hurston/Wright Legacy Awards for Published Black Writers (scheduled for October 2002), and all advances and royalties from the book will support the Hurston/Wright Foundation. Combining authors with a variety of flavorful writing, Gumbo will have readers clamoring for second helpings.
The Human Country
Available For The First Time In One Volume, The Very Best Of Mathews's Short Fiction; This expertly designed original paperback presents a comprehensive collection of internationally renowned poet and novelist Harry Mathews' short prose. From the hilarious 'The Broadcast, ' in which the narrator learns from a radio program that everything he needs in life should fit into one sock, to 'Calibration of Latitude, ' which follows Sir Joseph Pernican on a meandering and seemingly aimless but deeply moving journey, this is a long-awaited addition to Mathew's beloved and masterful canon.
Literatures of Latin America
This extraordinary anthology gathers together a broad selection of representative, authoritative writings--spanning antiquity to the present--from the non-Western civilizations of Latin America. It combines extensive introductions, headnotes, and bibliographies with excellent literary translations of the best contemporary and classical writers. KEY TOPICS: The selections reflect literary, religious, and philosophical traditions and reveal--despite cultural differences--the universality of life experiences. Primary literary genres (poetry, fiction and drama) as well as key religious, philosophical, historical, aesthetic, biographical and political texts are covered. MARKET: For readers of Latin American, World, and Non-Western Literature.
